Hand Built By Robots
by watchitstark
Summary: Hermione leaves after the war and then comes back when she finds herself unhappy in Australia, and finds more than she had expected back at home in England. Album Fic; Hand Built By Robots   Newton Faulkner
1. Chapter 1: To The Light

**Hand Built by Robots**

_A/N: This was going to be for a challenge but then I noticed the challenge said no Cross Gen and all I write is Cross Gen so I just did the challenge without being part of the challenge if that makes any sense? So basically you take an album and you have to write a fic where each chapter fits with a song from the album and extra kudos if you get the songs to work in order, which I have. So as you may have guessed by the title, which has nothing to do with the fic, I have picked the album _**Hand Built by Robots **_by _**Newton Faulkner**_. _

**To The Light**

The brunette gazed around her in dismay; one fight had caused all this? Hogwarts was only still standing because it was a magical building, and there were bodies, alive and dead, strewn everywhere.

"I can't- I've got-" she murmured brokenly as she fell to the floor.

"Shhh…" A soothing Scottish lilt made it to her ear as she was caught by strong arms.

"Don't even bother to tell me that everything will be fine; we both know that it won't be."

"It will be, eventually." She countered and once she had Hermione steady on her feet she turned her around so that they were face to face. "It's going to take a while but, everything _will_ be okay." She clarified.

"I've got to leave; I can't be here anymore."

"Hermione-" Minerva began warningly but the distraught brunette cut over her.

"Not forever, just a little while. I'll go to Australia and find my parents."

"Right now?" She asked a little sceptically.

"Right now." Hermione confirmed with a tiny, tiny smile.

"Well I hope you find what you're looking for."

"I will." She smiled again, a little wider this time, grabbing a discarded shoe as she did, quickly cleaning it and herself up before Transfiguring her now clean heavy sweater and loose jeans into black skinny jeans and a plain Gryffindor red t-shirt, and casting _Portus_ on the shoe.

"Where in Australia are you going?"

"This Portkey will take me to a place in the outback I once went exploring in when I had a whole summer in Perth, then I can Apparate to the Apparation Point that I found in Perth that same summer." Minerva looked her sadly, thinking about how much she had been forced to change in the last few years.

"The Hermione I remember wouldn't have been confidant enough to do this on her own."

"I know. But too much has changed, and I was already very independent when I first came here. Thank you Minerva." She said with another small smile.

"For what?" She asked quickly, confused.

"For being here for the last seven years of my life, for being prepared to help."

"That was nothing. What are you going to do for money?"

"There's a Gringotts in Perth, that's another reason why I picked there to go to."

"You've planned everything quite well considering you only just thought of it."

"Logical to the last, you know me." Minerva chuckled; it was almost like they were so caught up in the conversation they were successfully managing to block out their surroundings and the reality of the last year.

"Am I going to see you again?" She looked worried for a brief moment.

"Of course." Hermione leant up and pecked Minerva on the cheek, then she was gone, whirling through the air to her distant destination. As soon as she landed the Portkey stopped glowing and went back into a normal black girl's school shoe. She suddenly remembered that she hadn't changed her shoes, and she quickly looked down to see that she was still wearing a pair of tatty, battered trainers, which she quickly transfigured into red Converse hi-tops, then quickly stuffed her jeans into them. She unwound the leather strap that was around her wrist and deftly tied her hair up, then Apparated into Perth.

**HGMMHGMMHGMMHGMMHGMMHGMM**

"Hermione? We haven't seen you in years!" The owner of The Rusty Scales Pub and Inn exclaimed as she stepped into the light and airy bar that was miles different from The Leaky back home.

"I'm just… Taking a break." She said with a smile. A few years ago she had spent a whole summer here in one of the rooms that they rented out to customers.

"I heard about You-Know-Who, that's a terrible business, that is."

"That's over." She said with a tired smile, glad to be the first to deliver the good news.

"We won, Voldemort's dead and they're just rounding up the Death Eaters now." She yawned, finally realising how tired she was. Everyone in the pub cheered.

"I came here straight from the battlefield, I took a Portkey."

"You were part of the fighting?" Leanne asked, shocked.

"I am one of Harry's best friends." She said and almost laughed as people all over the pub stared at her, wide eyed. "Damn…. I came here to get away from all of that." She murmured. "Any chance of a room?" She asked Leanne, louder this time.

"Of course, on the house." She immediately replied and bustled over to a hook on the wall and took the key to the same room that Hermione had had all those years ago.

"I will pay you." She said firmly, "but tomorrow, once I've been to Gringotts."

"Do you want me to cook you something?"

"No thanks, for now I just need sleep." She went upstairs and threw herself into bed, falling asleep instantly, and finding that her dreams were not filled with the terrifying nightmares she had been plagued with for so long.


	2. Chapter 2: I Need Something

**I Need Something**

"I'm leaving." The brunette announced at dinner with her parents three years later. Both of her parents nodded, as if they had been expecting this for some time.

"We know." Jean put her hand on top of Hermione's, which was sat to the left of her plate."We had been expecting it earlier to be honest. You were happy here, and now you're not. So go back to England." She recommended. Hermione sighed in relief.

"Thank you. I'd been so worried about telling you both that I wanted to leave, especially after I abandoned you last time."

"It was necessary last time, and it's necessary this time. We just want you to be happy." Hermione's eyes filled with tears, but she didn't let any fall; it seemed that all she had done was cry over the last few years.

"Now remember, it'll be quite warm in England, because it's May, but it'll still be colder than it is here, so dress warmly." Michael advised and Hermione laughed.

"Will do Dad."

"When are you leaving?"

"If I leave now then it'll be morning back home."

"See, you still refer to it as home, even after three years here." Hermione laughed.

"It'll always be home. I better get packing then, and make an illegal Portkey." Jean sent her a stern look. "Oh Mum, I'm the lost third member of the Golden Trio; some guys will show up and then they'll recognise me and won't care anymore." She said with a cheeky grin and both of her parents sighed.

"Well we're not condoning it."

"I know." She replied with a laugh and vanished upstairs. The first thing she threw in her trunk were letters from Minerva, and then she fished them back out, reading the one on the top.

_Dear Hermione,_

_I know you feel alone right now, seeing as you have yet to find your parents, and you feel like I did after the Grindelwald war; like you can't trust yourself, like you need to believe in someone else, but trust me, you don't._

_Love, Minerva._

That letter had been penned near the end of the first year, while she felt like she needed something, anything to believe in. she still felt like something was missing, and she knew exactly where she was going to go after she had packed and dealt with the Ministry; Hogwarts. She wanted to see Minerva, regardless of the fact that it was in the middle of term.

She lugged her case back downstairs and looked at her parents.

"You know what the one thing I'm most sorry about is?" Jean sent her a quizzical look. "That I gave you the names Monica and Wendell Wilkins. What sort of good daughter does that?" The whole family collapsed into laughter, Hermione being the first to straighten up.

"I've left my owl here so that we can keep in touch, he'll be able to find me wherever, and I'll just borrow someone else's or send the reply back with him. This is not goodbye, it's just see you later." She finished firmly and hugged them both, then was whisked away by a Diet Coke can.

**HGMMHGMMHGMMHGMMHGMMHGMM**

The brunette got to the Hogwarts gates and had just landed on her feet when she found herself surrounded by Harry, Ron, Draco and Seamus, who were all telling her to give up her wand in perfect unison. All of their voices trailed off one by one when they noticed just who had been breaking the law.

"HERMIONE!" All of a sudden she was being bear hugged on either side by her two overzealous best friends. She laughed and attempted to hug them back, but her arms were trapped by the two boys.

"Minerva told us that you'd gone to Perth and that you were finding your parents. We then later got told that you'd found them and you were happy."

"Yes, that sounds about right." She said with a grin.

"Well, I'm going to have to fine you for breaking the law, so that'll be one dinner date on Saturday."

"Fine, I'll go for that. Why are the Aurors doing the Improper Use of Magic Office's job anyway?" She asked, bemused.

"Because we have nothing to do. All the Death Eaters have been rounded up and there's no crime anywhere. It is so weird. Loads of Aurors have been moved to different offices, there are only three teams of four left."

"Wow… What do you do then?"

"Routine stuff like this." Something about Harry's person bleeped and he jumped.

"Constant vigilance." Hermione reminded him and he laughed.

"We've gotta go. See you Saturday in the Three Broomsticks at seven!"

"Okay." She smiled and the four Ministry workers Apparated out, and she made her way through the gates and up the long, winding path through the castle's expansive grounds.

When she reached the gargoyle she realised something; she had no idea what the password was, then she noticed the shocked expression on the usually grumpy gargoyle's face.

"What? Is there something on my face?"

"You're Miss Granger, correct?" She nodded and the gargoyle immediately opened the way up.

"Why….?" She asked, stunned, as she moves onto the revolving staircase.

"I was told to let you straight up, regardless of the time of day."

"Oh… Well, thank you. Can I call you Boris?" She asked with a grin and the gargoyle laughed; something that she hadn't thought that he could do.

"If you must." Boris replied and she laughed then knocked on Minerva's door, waving goodbye to Boris as she did.

"Come in…?" Minerva murmured loudly enough for Hermione to hear, but she could hear the confusion in her own voice; it was six in the morning; who on Earth would be visiting her?

"Hermione?" She asked in blatant shock as the door opened and a nervous looking brunette was revealed.

"No, night troll, obviously." She replied drily as Minerva stood and rounded the desk, rushing to the door and hugging Hermione. The brunette's shock by the usually stoic woman's show of affection wore off quickly and she wrapped her arms around the tall woman's waist, burying her head in the crook of her neck.

"It's good to have you back." Minerva pulled away and brushed her hands down Hermione's arms until she grabbed the brunette's smaller ones and tugged her over to the tartan sofa in front of the fire in one corner of the vast office. "So why are you back?"

"I just…. It felt like something was missing and I knew it was time to come back."

"I am glad though." Minerva surveyed Hermione's appearance and noticed how her chestnut hair was now shot through with gold from the sun, and that she was very, very tanned. Also, she had put back on all the weight that she had lost while on the run so she looked healthy again.

"You look so well." She said, pleased.

"So do you." Hermione remarked; Minerva too had put back on the weight she had lost, and her cheeks didn't look quite so hollow.

"So where are you going to go?" Minerva asked quickly, steering the topic away from herself.

"I don't know to be honest." Hermione laughed. " Probably the Leaky Cauldron."

"I have a spare room, you're welcome to make use of it."

"Really? I hate to be a bother."

"You're no bother Hermione, don't worry about it." Hermione smiled gratefully.

"Thank you so much. I'm going to go attack the library." She said with a grin and Minerva laughed.

"Good plan. I'll see you at breakfast?"

"Yep. I assume I go sit with you at the Staff Table?" Minerva nodded and Hermione grinned again, jumping up, ready to pursue new knowledge.

"See you!" She exclaimed and raced off like an excitable child, leaving Minerva chuckling behind her.


	3. Chapter 3: All I Got

**All I Got**

"Get your brain on track Hermione!" The brunette hissed after her brain wandered off after the emerald-eyed witch that she was currently staying with for the third time that morning. In the end Hermione had got a job in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, and she mostly dealt with corrupt goblins. She had been surprised to find that learning the goblin's native tongue had been rather easy, which meant that they couldn't converse without her knowing what they were saying. Most of her job was paperwork, as for each case she had to fill out all sorts of forms, and lately she wasn't getting on top of her work like she used to, simply because all she could think of was Minerva!

"Hermione, you coming to lunch?" Harry suddenly popped up in her office.

"That's rude; you know that you're supposed to knock first." Harry sniggered as she hadn't even looked up from her paperwork; he did this whenever he was in the office at lunchtime. "But yes, I'm coming." She looked down at the piece of parchment and noticed that there were doodling of little cat faces with squares around their eyes around the edge and sighed again, quickly removing them with her wand, and then got up to go to lunch with Harry.

**HGMMHGMMHGMMHGMMHGMM**

"You're distracted." He noted as soon as they sat down for lunch.

"What? No! You know me, I'll just be dreaming up a plan to improve Elf Rights." She said with a smile.

"You're not. Who is she?" He asked teasingly and Hermione shushed him.

"You're being ridiculous, there isn't anyone."

"Suuuuurrrreeee there isn't." He said with a smirk and Hermione just laughed.

"You can't smirk nearly as well as some people Harry." She reminded him.

"Oh yeah, like who?" He challenged.

"Minerva, Malfoy, any Slytherin." She said, pretending to think.

"McGonagall can smirk?" A stunned Harry asked.

"Yeah, gosh, everyone knows that!" She teased with an exaggerated roll of her eyes and he laughed.

"If you're sure. Although the dreamy, slightly confused and annoyed look on your face when I popped into your office says otherwise."

"I was just having a hard time over the paperwork." Hermione argued valiantly.

"Oh sure. It was the same look that Ron used to have whenever he thought of you at an inopportune moment."

"Is he still interested in me?" She asked, successfully managing to steer the conversation from herself.

"I don't think so, but if you're planning on using him as your lesbian beard than I'm sure he'd jump at the chance."

"I'm not interested in him, no way; I was just wandering if I'd have to ward off any awkward advances." She shrugged and Harry laughed.

"Nope, I think we're all good on that front."

**HGMMHGMMHGMMHGMMHGMM**

"You just gotta relax." She reminded herself as she slipped into the Hall through the door that sat behind the Staff Table and took her usual seat next to Minerva, with Snape on her other side, whom she was on good terms with these days.

"Good evening Minerva, Severus." She said pleasantly as she spooned Lasagne onto her plate and grabbed a couple of pieces of garlic bread. Minerva turned from her conversation with Filius to smile at her.

"Good evening." She felt butterflies in her tummy but she fought them down and smiled back then she dug into her dinner, sitting back and letting the conversation was over her, her eyes almost never leaving Minerva's face.

**_A/N: Okay, so I know this is a short one, and I'll just warn you now that the next one is too, but part fo the challenge was that is have to be 500 words or over and it is, and I will make the other longer so that is. :)_**


End file.
